


The Right Thing

by evilgiraff



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-04
Updated: 2012-11-04
Packaged: 2017-11-17 23:14:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/554255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evilgiraff/pseuds/evilgiraff
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A comment!fic inspired by photos posted at the LJ community jim_and_bones.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Right Thing

He knows it's the right thing to do, walking away. Knows that there's nothing he can do any more, nothing he can say. God knows, he's tried everything he can think of. But there's only so many times he can hear "I'm sorry", only so many times he can wipe away the blood and kiss each bruise as it blooms under his lips.

He knows all this, and yet he can't quite bring himself to turn the key, to pull away from the kerb and on to the road that leads anywhere, anywhere away from here. One more time, he tells himself. He'll look back once more, and then he'll leave.

So he looks, turns his head and finds those blue eyes framed in red and black, finds those scraped knuckles that are white even at this distance as long fingers curl tight around the doorframe.

He watches Jim take one step, then two, then three. He watches split lips form a silent "please, Bones", and it's this that breaks the spell.

His voice is scratchy, words pushing past the lump in his throat and bubbling out of their own volition. "I can't."

He turns the key, the purr of the engine barely audible over the beating of his heart, the rushing of blood through his ears. Jim stops dead, halfway across the road with one hand raised in an aborted gesture.

Still he doesn't move, keeps one hand on the key and the other on the wheel, watches as Jim's mouth twists into a grim parody of a smile.

That half-raised hand falls back to Jim's side as he turns and walks back the way he's come, looking smaller somehow, folded in on himself.

One look back, he tells himself. He'll leave, unless Jim looks back. He watches Jim stumble up the steps, weave his way inside and disappear in the gloom of the corridor.

For half a heartbeat, Bones hesitates. The door is still open - that counts as a look back, doesn't it? He sighs, turns the key once more, and follows Jim, just like he always does.


End file.
